Andy's Interview with A. Magazine

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border-top:1px solid #393939; clear:both; display:none; width:100%!important; position:relative; z-index:999999!important; height:90px!important"> <div class="adCenterClass" style="display:block!important; overflow:hidden; width:916px;"> <div id="footerAd_container" style="display:block!important; float:left; width:728px"> <iframe id="lycosFooterAdiFrame" style="border:0; display:block; float:left; height:96px; overflow:hidden; padding:0; width:750px"></iframe> </div> </div> </div> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0 height="100%"><tr> <td valign="top" width=185 BGCOLOR="#3366CC" TEXT="#080000" background="04aff483.gif"> <div> <IMG SRC="07cd3d60.jpg" border=0 width="211" height="214" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> </td> <td valign="top" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="04bff483.gif"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#6666FF" FACE="Chelmo" ><B>PringleGyrl's Fantasy</b></FONT><FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#663399" FACE="Times New Roman" >    </FONT> |    <B> </b><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#0000BF" FACE="Comic Sans MS" ><A HREF="id25.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Andy Lau"><U><B>home</b></U></A></FONT></div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> Andy's Interview with A Magazine <embed src="HTMLobj-639/lee.mid" autostart="true" loop="true" hidden="true">  </div> <bR> <div> In the February/March 2000 issue of A. Magazine : Inside Asian America, there was a two page interview with the Hong Kong Pop Star Andy Lau. Below will be the interview (everything below is quoted in the interview in A. Magazine) *Quite Lengthy*</div> <bR> <div> Where were you born, and how did you get started as a performer?</div> <div>       <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >I was born in Hong Kong.  At first, you know, I wanted to be a film director, but there was no way of learning how to be a director in Hong Kong. So I decided to take part in this training course at TVB (Hong Kong's leading TV Company)...</FONT></div> <div> An acting class?</div> <div>       <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >Not just acting; they actually taught writing, singing, fighting - everything about entertainment. I was 18 - I'd just finished high school. After a year, they told me that I'd be a star. And I believed them. What else was I going to do? So I signed a TVB contract.</FONT></div> <div> Is this course a step that a lot of Hong Kong stars take?</div> <div>      No. Some do, some don't.</div> <div> So how do most people end up getting started then?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>"Miss Hong Kong" [<I>laughs</I>]</div> <div> Well, Obviously you weren't going to be Miss Hong Kong...</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>No, obviously not. Not even <I>Mr.</I> Hong Kong. But a number of big stars came through TVB. Chow Yun Fat. Tony Leung Chiu-Wai [<I>Chungking Express</I>], Stephen Chow [Hong Kong's Top Comic actor]. Stephen had it the hardest of all of us, because he spent eight years at TVB doing children's programs. <I>Eight years</I> doing children's programs! Ohh...</div> <div> Still, he ended up being a huge star... Are there any secrets that they taught you that I wouldn't know?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>None that I can talk about. Go take the class yourself! [<I>laughs</I>] But it's not really about "secrets"! TVB owns everything : The TV station, production studios, music labels, if they say you're going to be a star, they make you a star.</div> <div> Your parents must have said,  "Oh my, our son wants to be an entertainer." Were they concerned?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Of course they wanted me to keep on studying, but they couldn't really stop me. My father was a fireman. He wanted me to become a doctor. But even as a kid, I thought about making movies. Anyway, I signed the contract, and then TVB just... <I>left me there. </I>[<I>laughs</I>] I sat around for a year doing nothing. So I got a job singing in a piano bar.</div> <div> Did you earn enough to survive?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Well, I had a monthly salary from TVB. But if you don't actually act in anything the money is terrible - it was about HK$1000 a month [about $125]. I was living at home, and my parents were asking everyday, "So when are you going to be a star?" And I'd say : "Soon"!  It was a good thing I finally got a job! In 1982, I made a program about how to choose the right way to live. You know, "Don't do drugs." It was called something like "Goodbye to the Devil." I was a character named Ah Long. Nobody knew my real name, so people would come to me on the street and say "Ah Long, Ah Long!" Then a director named Ahh Hui cast me in the movie <I>Boat People, </I>which was very successful.</div> <div> And after that, TVB wanted you.</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >They put me in a TV series called - something like "The Heroes." It's a historical drama, based on a book by Jin Yong [Hong Kong's most popular author]. After that, boom : I became a star. That was 1985.</FONT></div> <div> So you went from making just HK$1000 per month to being known everywhere. Did young girls start chasing you down the street?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >Well, let's just say... I got noticed. But after 1986, there was a problem between me and TVB, because I wanted to make movies, and they wanted to keep me on their TV contract. By that time I was up to HK$7000. Still not very much. And after I told them I wanted to do movie, they put me back on the shelf again. I got the award for the most popular TV artist in 1986, and they wouldn't even let me receive it.</FONT></div> <div> They said "You couldn't accept it"?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >Yeah. And they killed the series. I just disappeared. I was doing the show, and I was introducing sports, and I was the host of some variety shows - and suddenly, it was nothing.</FONT></div> <div> So what did you do?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Well, I had to do <I>something. </I>I learned to fight, and I learned to ride a horse. Action stuff, because Jackie Chan was so popular. I learned to be an action star. And in 1987, when my TVB contract ran out, I signed with Golden Harvest [then the top film studio - home to Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan].</div> <div> When did you start singing?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >1986. I signed with Capitol Artists, which was the "official" record label of TVB. If you were under contract with TVB, then you had to be on Capitol Artists. TVB really controls everything, even today.</FONT></div> <div> When you did your first album, was it immediately successful?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >No. It took five years - my first big hit was in 1991</FONT></div> <div> And then all of a sudden people started knowing you as a singer. That's always amazed me : in Hong Kong, if you sing, then you act, and if you're an actor, you sing. How does that work?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >Hong Kong is a small market; popularity goes a long way. And we learned how to do everything in the TVB course...</FONT></div> <div> How much of the overall package comes from the record company? Do they say, "We want you to appeal to teenage girls... we think you're an idol"?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Actually, The audience has the power to classify you as an idol or a "real artist." If they think you're an idol, you have no choice. But there's marketing involved, too. Over there, if the most popular guy sings "blah blah blah," you have to sing "blah blah blah." so I sang "blah blah blah." [<I>laughs</I>] At the time, the big stars were, Leslie Cheung and Alan Tam, everything they gave me was Leslie this and Alan that. </div> <div>      It's not just the music, it's the promotion. Everytime Leslie and Alan were on some program, they told me, "You have to be there, too - go there and stand next to them!" I remember in 1982, they said, "Okay, Alan Tam is having a concert - you go be a guest singer." They put me there and tried to sing, but I don't think anyone in the audience was listening - it was terrible. No matter what I did, until 1991, I wasn't popular.  As an actor, yes. As a singer, No. Then in 1993, I started my own production house : New Melodies. And things <I>really</I> took off.</div> <div> So for the first time you were in control?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Yes, I could be what I wanted - a more <I>Chinese</I> singer. My biggest hit was even called "I am Chinese." I just thought, "If I want to be different, I have to guide my own image." In my albums, you can always find songs that are more Chinese - maybe in the lyrics, maybe the arrangements.</div> <div> How did you end up becoming one of the "Four Heavenly Kings"?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >The newspapers did it back in 1991, when the big stars on the market were me and Jackie Cheung. They wrote "Hong Kong music is divided into two families - the Jackie Cheung family and the Andy Lau family." Then when Leon Lai came along, they said "Now there are three big families holding up the sky." Then came Aaron, and all of a sudden, we were the "Four Heavenly Kings" of pop music.</FONT></div> <div> How did you feel about this? Was it strange?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Well, did I have a choice? [<I>laughs</I>]</div> <div> One of the things that I remember is back when the hype was just crazy, your fan clubs would have big fights... like gang wars. How did that happen? Were there rivalries between the four of you?</div> <div>       <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >I think the fans just wanted to prove how loyal the were... Once I realized my fans and Leon's fans and Jackie's fans couldn't live in the same room, I told them, "We're all different.  If I do badly, it doesn't mean he'll do well." The four of us, we know the game, and the game is marketing.</FONT></div> <div> What are some of the things you've experienced that were strange, funny, or scary even?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>This year I was in Tibet - it's far away from Hong Kong, and I never thought before, "Gee, am I popular there?" But when I got to the stadium, they started to shout, "Andy Lau! Andy Lau!" Other singers were on the bill, but no matter who came on, they kept shouting "Andy Lau!" [<I>laughs</I>] After the show, I went back to the hotel to try to take a rest. But a huge crowd surrounded the hotel and they started singing my songs - even my <I>first</I> song that was a hit... 10 years ago.</div> <div> Do you ever have problems with individuals? Fans who are just too obsessed?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >A lot of problems, but it's only a small... percentage of people who do that. Every time there's a rumor I'm going to get married, one of them will do something that scares me...</FONT></div> <div> How come so many actors want to come to the US, or Canada, or Australia now? A lot of the stars even directors, want to come to Hollywood.</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Well, for myself, I want to make movies here in America, because I want to learn something - not because I have anything to prove. I came to New York recently to receive an award from <I>Billboard.</I> Before the show, no one tried to talk with me. But then they called me up to stage and said, "Andy Lau has sold so many millions of records, and he's made 95 movies." All of a sudden, people were coming up to me and saying "Is that true?"</div> <div> So you would ever want to move here to the US?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >No. I'm from Hong Kong. That's what I want people to see. I appreciate what Jackie Chan has done - he keeps his own image wherever he goes. I'm an Aisan man, and I don't have to try to be anything else. Like Bruce Lee.</FONT></div> <div> Have you looked at any screenplays? Is there anything you've thought about or been offered?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Actually... you know <I>Entrapment?</I> I received a script for the role that ended up going to this fat guy. [<I>laughs</I>]  I told them : if this were a good role, I'd do it for free. You want me to do this, you better give me money, because this...</div> <div> ... is a terrible role.</div> <div>     <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >Right.</FONT></div> <div> What directors or actors would you like to work with if you had a choice?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >Brad Pitt! and Robert DeNiro. and Sean Connery.</FONT></div> <div> Well, if you had done <I>Entrapment...</I></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>Oh, yeah - and the woman who was in <I>Entrapment </I>[<I>laughs</I>]</div> <div> Catherine Zeta-Jones... yeah, she's gorgeous. So you're 39 now... 10 years from now, what do you see yourself doing? Do you want to retire someday?</div> <div>      <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >The only chance you get to rest in life is before age 12. As an artist, you always want to change your role. When I'm 60, then I'll do the things that 60-year-old artists do.</FONT></div> <div> And what do you want to do next?</div> <div> <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0033" FACE="Comic Sans MS" >     </FONT>I want to be a professional bowler. [<I>laughs</I>] I'm not a very good bowler right now, but there's always hope.</div> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>